North Korea has hilarious propaganda, but it’s important to remember that all of it rests on fear of a regime that’s legitimately terrifying. Case in point: according to recent reports, Hyon Song-wol (pictured), a North Korean singer rumored to be an ex-lover of Kim Jong-un, was executed by firing squad after being arrested on pornography charges August 17th. I’m told that, trying to copy Western pornography, the filmmakers simply misinterpreted the directive to “line up a bunch of guys and have them shoot on her.” (Worst sentence I’ve ever written? Possibly.)

The reports in South Korea’s Chosun Ilbo newspaper indicate that Hyon, a singer with the Unhasu Orchestra, was among those arrested on August 17 for violating domestic laws on pornography.

All 12 were machine-gunned three days later, with other members of North Korea’s most famous pop groups and their immediate families forced to watch. The onlookers were then sent to prison camps, victims of the regime’s assumption of guilt by association, the reports stated.

Jesus, I’m surprised they didn’t shoot the people who dug the graves.

Hyon’s band was responsible for a string of patriotic hits in North Korea, including “Footsteps of Soldiers,” “I Love Pyongyang,” “She is a Discharged Soldier” and “We are Troops of the Party.” Her popularity reportedly peaked in 2005 with the song “Excellent Horse-Like Lady.”

Damn you, North Korea. Even in a story about mass executions, I can’t help but laugh at “Excellent Horse-Like Lady.” North Korea leads the world in tragicomedy.

The 12 who were executed were singers, musicians or dancers with the Hyon’s band,, the Unhasu Orchestra or the Wanghaesan Light Music Band and were accused of making videos of themselves performing sex acts and then selling the recordings. [A story few North Korean experts believe, saying the executions were more than likely political.]

Kim Jong-un, who became leader of North Korea after the sudden death of his father in December 2011, is believed to have met Hyon about 10 years ago and struck up a relationship.

His father, Kim Jong-il, did not approve of the relationship and ordered him to break it off. Hyon subsequently married an officer in the North Korean military and reportedly had a baby, although there are suggestions that Hyon continued to see Kim after her marriage.

Kim’s wife, Ri Sol-ju, was also a member of the Unhasu Orchestra before marriage and one theory is that Ri objected to the continuing high profile of her husband’s former girlfriend.

The theory was slightly undermined, however, when the guy who floated it was drowned in a cement cube and dropped into a volcano.

Kim Chol, vice minister of the army, was executed with a mortar round in October 2012.

Kim Chol was reportedly executed for drinking and carousing during the official mourning period after Kim Jong-il’s death.

On the explicit orders of Kim Jong-un to leave “no trace of him behind, down to his hair,” according to South Korean media, Kim Chol was forced to stand on a spot that had been zeroed in for a mortar round and “obliterated.”

I’m usually a total pacifist, but I really want to bomb the fuck out of Kim Jong-Un. He just has such an added douche quotient that most evil dictators don’t have. Like, I can begrudgingly respect a dictator who had to claw his way to the top because however evil that may be I’m sure that shit’s not easy. But Kim Jong-Un has lived a life where everyone constantly blows sunshine up his ass. He’s like that rich asshole from your school who has everything handed to him via the power of nepotism times 1,000.

Jong Un apparently mortared a guy for daring to drink during the official mourning period for his father. He had a mortar zeroed in on a precise spot, had the guy staked to the ground and literally blew his ass, and the rest of him, to pieces. (Am I using it right, Brendan?)

This is another good reason *to* keep discussing Miley. Hmm, concentrate on the horrors of “modern” life in Syria and North Korea or focus on a young girl’s ass? If there’s a benefit to me clutching my pearls in shock every time a psychotic despot acts like a psychotic despot, fine, but otherwise it seems about as productive as keeping a sick person in my thoughts and prayers.

The drummer with Hyon’s band, Won Rast Long, had a lucky escape; two weeks before the rest of the band were rounded up he got signed by Spinal Tap for their next tour of Asia.

This is a bloody awful story. Are there any laws in North Korea that the violation of which aren’t punishable by atrocity? Don’t have a state sanctioned haircut? Oh you better believe that’s a paddlin’. And by paddlin’ we’re gonna burn your fucking face off.

I can’t stop giggling at them obliterating some dude with a mortar round. It’s like Wile E Coyote painting a big bullseye on the ground under a boulder hanging by a rope. “Oh no General, no particular reason, just stand right there in that crater for a second…”

Can you imagine how nervous the mortar team were before firing? They were actually the second unit because the first unit blew up the country’s only ice cream van. They were then forced through an industrial mincer and fed to their parents, raw. No seasoning either. Barbarians.

Vince, you missed the worst part. The victim’s families and loved ones were forced to witness the execution and afterwards they were shipped off to a prison labor camp in accordance with NK’s guilt-by-association laws.

I speak, write and read Korean. the interpreter completely fucked up the translation. The group was killed because of the pornographic song, Excellent Horse, Like Lady. I don’t want to tell you the lyrics. I don’t go in for that sort of thing.

If they tried killing people for making, looking at, distributing pornography here in the States, I’m not sure that once all the guilty were lined up against the wall that there would be anyone left to hold the machine guns.